


Gated

by nickloveshiskitten



Category: One Direction (Band), Radio 1 RPF
Genre: Hybrid AU, Hybrid Louis, Hybrids, Kitten Louis, M/M, Tomlinshaw - Freeform, hybrid!louis, kitten!Louis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-23
Updated: 2014-03-23
Packaged: 2018-01-16 18:24:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1357426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nickloveshiskitten/pseuds/nickloveshiskitten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: Nick and Louis go to the park where you can meet other hybrids, they have like a paddock so the hybrids wont get lost. And then a hybrid picks a fight with Lou.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gated

**Author's Note:**

> HEyy. I thought I posted this last week but...obviously i didnt but I hope you guys enjoy it!!! Ps i love kudos and comments pweeeese. x

The unusually bright sun shined down on them as they relaxed on a park bench, enjoying the unexpectedly warm day. They were at one of the nicer hybrid parks. “Nicer” meaning that it lacked the usual prison-yard feel the other parks in the city did. Hybrid parks became a thing a few years ago when over-protective mothers who didn’t want their children near hybrids and other ignorant citizens picketed the parks and harassed the hybrids and their owners who went there. The government later issued the mandate on hybrid parks, stating that they were needed so that the hybrids wouldn’t get away or stolen from their owners. However the parks that the government proposed were not what was actually built. The hybrid parks that existed today were on the poorest land and were often surrounded with intimidating barbed wire fences that opened to a security booth that checked the hybrids and their owners into and out of the park. But Nick and Louis’ park was minutes out of Prim Rose Hill and was actually pretty decent. 

It was surrounded by only a thin, low black fence and had nice benches and grass. Also, the security booth was only manned by a single guard, who knew the pair by now and was pretty friendly with them. 

Now, they sat in relative silence, Louis’ head in Nick’s lap as he watched people pass by on the other side of the fence as Nick played with Louis’ hair distractedly and toyed on his phone. It wasn’t until Louis heard the loud jingle of bells across the fence did he speak up.

“Nicky, what’s that?” He asked sitting up to try and see what had caused the noise.

“An ice cream man,” Nick replied in a bored tone, looking up from his phone to see the cart with an ice cream cone plastered across the side. 

“Ice cream?” Louis’ kitten ears perked up in interest and a bright smile broke across his face.

“Mhm.” Nick’s gaze didn’t lift from his phone though and Louis frowned, pushing himself into Nick’s lap.

“Hello,” Louis giggled, smiling sweetly at Nick.

“Hi,” Nick said, raising his eyebrows comically. “Can I help you with something?”

“Can we get ice cream?” The kitten-eared boy asked hopefully, even pouting a little to insure that he got what he wanted. He knew how to play Nick by now, and did it so often that it came easily to him.

“I guess.” He leaned forward and pecked Louis once on the lips before tapping his hip. “Gotta get up though, love.”

“Thank you!” The kitten-eared boy cheered as he hopped off Nick’s lap and waved him off as the older lad headed for the gate.

“I’ll be right back, love.” Nick called before leaving the hybrid park with a quick nod at the guard.

Louis collapsed forward on his stomach and sighed happily when the sun beat warmly against his back. It was comforting to him: the warmth of the sun settling over him like a warm blanket and he yawned, content, as his eyes slipped closed. He was just drifting off to sleep when he felt someone pull on his tail, hard. Louis yelped, pushing himself back into a sitting position to see the offending tail-puller.

Two burly cat hybrids stood before him, both wearing stained t-shirts and ripped jeans and Louis noted with a tad bit of disgust that the shorter only had a mangled stump for a tail while the other had a missing chunk in his ear and a bar through his left eyebrow. They both had their arms crossed across their broad chests so that their biceps bulged.

Louis couldn’t hold back the whimper that escaped and visibly cringed when the shorter made a move to swing at him.

“You’re in our spot, Kitty.” The one who faked the punch muttered, flicking his wrist toward Louis as if to say “so scat.”

Louis’ stubbornness reared its head then as he stammered out a quiet “It doesn’t have your name on it.” And a red hot blush crept up his neck as they laughed at his stutter.

“Aw, is the little house cat nervous?” The other mocked, taking a step closer to Louis so that he was leaning over him intimidatingly.

It was getting increasingly obvious to Louis that these two were “strays” as the government officially called them; hybrids that were too aggressive to be adopted out and either lived out on the streets and joined a gang or lived secretly in homeless shelters. They were characterized as being aggressive and bitter of any “house-pet hybrids,” hybrids that were happily adopted out and lived peacefully with their owners. An involuntary shudder ran down Louis’ back as he recalled all the horror stories he’d heard about them from his time in the shelter, but he was not about to be bullied by two mangled up mutts, no matter how scared he was.

“G-get a-away fr-from me.” Louis hissed is voice wavering as the strays shared an incredulous look before their features turned to stone and their fists clenched at their sides.

“What as that, kitty?” One asked with a dangerous light in his eyes as the other growled “Are you seriously gonna talk back to us?”

The smaller hybrid shivered, his kitten ears tucking back into his hair and his tail puffing up as he they came even closer to him. He poised ready to run within a second’s notice.

“I-I said to get away from me.” Louis repeated, his eyes going wide as the shorter of the two got in his face again and Louis had to resist the urge to gag as the stray’s foul breath fanned across his face.

“One more change, pet, what did you say?”

“That your breath reeks.” Louis muttered his voice quiet but firm. No one, no matter who they were they did not have the right to talk down to him; it was one of the many things that Nick had taught him and that combined with his own stubbornness had enforced that mentality.

“You asked for it, kitty.” The shorter stray growled before grabbing a fistful of Louis’ shirt and yanking him up, his feet dangling above the ground.

“Tough little house cat,” the other said mockingly as Louis tried to swipe at the rough hands that held him. He kicked out blindly as they laughed, suddenly finding himself on the floor after his foot came in contact with his capture’s groin. The stray had pain written all over his face as Louis jumped to his feet and the other tried to get a grip on Louis but only managed to claw up Louis’ forearm as he took off. Louis winced at the sting of the scratches and clutched his arm to his chest as he ran. He moved toward a climbable tree that had branches that hung over the fence to the human park, toward safety.

His breathing was rabid as launched himself at the tree, trying to ignore the burn in his legs and the sounds of shouts behind him as he started to climb. And for once he was happy for his small size as he quickly and easily scaled up the tree and jumped off the branch; landing on the other side just as the strays were reaching the tree.

Louis didn’t check to see if they were still following as he took off toward the hybrid park entrance, knowing even in his frenzied state that that was the area Nick would be around. He quickly hid under the bench when he got there, his whole body shaking with adrenaline and nerves.

The kitten-eared boy leaned his forehead against his knees, his breathing loud and rabid. In fact, his breathing was so loud that he didn’t hear Nick calling him until the said man was directly in his face.

“Kitten? What are you doing out here?” His only answer, though, was Louis flinging himself into Nick’s arms with a sob.

“Louis, what happened?” Nick demanded urgently. He sat back on his heels and rubbed over Louis’ back as the kitten-eared boy sobbed into his chest.

The comforting words that Nick whispered to him fell on deaf ears though, because the only thing that Louis registered was the utter feeling of pure safety that Nick’s presence brought him.

“Nicky, can we go home?” Louis whispered brokenly against Nick’s chest, cutting off whatever question Nick was about to ask.

The older lad pulled back, studying Louis’ face for a moment and taking in how broken he looked before nodding. “Yes, love we can go home and talk there. Besides,” He added when he saw Louis’ arm as they got up. “We have to clean that cut out.”

Louis sent him a grateful look at Nick wrapped a supportive arm around his waist and he curled into Nick’s side as they walked back to their car.

“Thank you,” Louis murmured, as Nick helped him into the car. Nick only smiled tightly in response, knowing that he wouldn’t be able to talk without asking questions and the last thing Louis right now was to be interrogated.

When they got back to their flat Nick immediately instructed for Louis to sit on the couch as he went into the bathroom to get the first-aid kit.

He rushed back into the living room to find Louis sitting on the very edge of the couch and, Nick noted, that his kitten ears were still hidden in his hair.

“Where’d your ears go, love?” Nick tried to tease, ruffling Louis’ hair in an effort to raise his spirits.

Louis smiled, albeit a little wobbly, up at him as his kitten ears slowly rose back up. “Sorry.”

“No need to be sorry, darling.” Nick said lightly as he sat down next to him, opening the first aid kit on the coffee table.

“Can I see you arm?” Nick asked as he poured peroxide onto a cotton ball. Louis held out his arm obediently and winced when Nick dabbed at the three shallow scratches with the cotton ball.

“Why’s it bubbly?” Louis asked when Nick was finished cleaning it and only a thin white foam covered the scratches. Nick had to hide his smile as he dug a bandage out of the first aid kid, at least Louis was starting to act like himself again.

“That means it’s working, love.” Nick said as he placed the bandage over the scratches and placing a kiss to the stark white material before murmuring, “all done.”

“Thank you,” Louis said thickly, blinking tears from eyes again, knowing what question Nick was going to ask now that his wound was clean. And that feeling of shame and cowardice built up in him again as the memory of him running from the strays entered the forefront of his mind.

“So do you want to talk about what happened at the park?” Nick asked awkwardly, watching as Louis’ eyes shot down to stare holes into his lap.

“Strays,” was all Louis uttered in a shaky whisper, his eyes never leaving his lap. The word did spark some recognition in Nick, he’d seen it splashed across newspapers and tabloids countless times but he’d never really heard anyone talk about it. He knew that they were homeless hybrids, those unsuited for adoption, and those, of course, who weren’t captured and put down yet.

“Strays? Were they the ones that hurt you?” Nick said, clenching his fists in his lap at the thought of anyone laying a hand on his kitten.

Louis nodded, a tear sliding down his face as he elaborated. “I was in their spot and instead of moving I argued. I was just really, really stupid. And I got so angry ‘cause they were talking about me like I was nothing. Then I ran like a coward…”

“No, no, no.” Nick argued, collecting Louis into his arms and cradling him against his chest. “You are not a coward or stupid or nothing. You’re my Louis, and you did the right thing by sticking up for yourself and making sure that you didn’t get hurt. If I was there I could have dealt with them, they wouldn’t have even come near you…”

“Not your fault either.” Louis said meekly, shaking his head against Nick’s chest.

They fell quiet after that, both mulling over their own thoughts and before long Nick heard Louis quietly snore against his chest.

Nick still felt responsible though, despite what Louis had said and he’d be damned if he ever let Louis get hurt again, or anyone for that matter. And as his own eyes slipped closed he made a mental note to call Hybrid Control in the morning to report that dangerous strays were in the park. It would be the least he could do in the aftermath of what they had done to Louis.


End file.
